A Baby Boomer and Beatle fanatic since their first appearance on Ed Sullivan back in 1964, this blog is dedicated to my thoughts on the Fab Four and Pop Culture

Monday, December 29, 2008

Beatles Monopoly Game

I got the Beatles' Monopoly for Christmas (Thanks Sonja and Mark!). And like all 'official' Beatles/Apple products, it's very well done. It's obvious that the designers put a lot of thought and time into their choices. Albums are now the properties (the exception being the two high-end properties which are 'Abbey Road' and 'Apple' studios). Concert tickets are railways and Candlestick and Shea are the utilities. The Community Chest and Chance cards are 'Beatlemania' and 'Fab Four' spaces and for symbols, they have the drum logos from Magical Mystery Tour (the red 'love' one) and Pepper (the elaborate old fashioned one).

What's especially cool is that they include both British and American albums, and lay them out in chronological order. I knew the designers were 'super fans' when I noticed that they use the 'butcher' cover for the Yesterday...and Today space. Nice.

The tokens are a Strawberry (Fields), a (I am the) Walrus, Octopus (Garden), (Rocky) Raccoon, (Maxwell's) Silver Hammer and a (Here Comes the) Sun. Again, this is a example of how well they thought this thing out. It's no coincidence that they have included Ringo and George songs as tokens. This way, if you're a George fan, you can take the 'Sun' piece. The houses and hotels are black and white (respectively) instead of the original green and red. Not sure what the 'Beatles' connection there is with that, but it is cool and sort of modern looking. I played the game and chose the raccoon (just cuz it's so darn cute) and spent Boxing Day afternoon playing. Unlike some other 'specialized' monopoly games I've tried, this Beatles' version seems to be well tested and everything works well. The only flaw was being a little unclear on the directions on one of the Beatlemania cards. But it was no biggie.

I lost, but a splendid time was had by all. Can't wait to play again. And next time, I am the Walrus.

About Me

In the "real" world, I work at a Bay Area dot.com job. But I'm also the bass player for the Portland punk band "The Cleavers" (we played our first gig in 1978, most recent one in 2004). I'm co-writer of a bunch of our songs and even "sing" a few on them.
And I was a founding member of another Portland group, "Theatre of Sheep" (circa 1980's).